This invention relates to a hydraulic excavator.
In general, in earth moving vehicles called hydraulic excavators, the implement attached boom-arm linkage adapted to operate an implement such as a bucket etc. has a long reach. Therefore, it has been a normal practice for such a vehicle to keep it stationarily to ensure the stability thereof during its earth moving work.
For this reason, vehicles of the type specified are not adapted to carry out satisfactorily operations requiring running, for example, transporting and running operations with the earth and sand loaded in the bucket thereof. Further, it is difficult for such vehicles to self-propel under a stable condition on inclined lands.
Besides, the implement attached boom-arm linkage having a long reach requires increasing the overall length of the vehicle, and therefore the vehicles of the type specified are inconvenient from the viewpoint of transportation thereof.
Further, in order to employ the vehicles of such a type for multi-purposes, replacements of their buckets for converting back hoe operation into front loading operation and vice versa have been made. However, such replacements of buckets have been conducted manually requiring a considerable time, and so it has been substantially impossible for the operator to carry out the replacement work rapidly.